“Where there’s life, there’s movement”. Biological proteins from dynein, myosin and kinesin superfamilies literally walk, step by step, along the polymeric filaments, executing essential tasks such as organelle transport. Inspired by nature, development of artificial molecules that mimic the aspects of the biological system dynamics, has become a potential research interest for the creation of artificial transport system. To date, DNA based molecular walkers and small molecular walkers have been synthesized. Reversibility of weak non-covalent interactions as well as the robustness of dynamic covalent bonds have been utilised for the movement of the molecular walkers along the surfaces and molecular tracks using both diffusional process and ratchet mechanism. In this presentation, a small introduction on synthetic small molecular walkers and their application has been approached.References:
1. Delius, M. V.; Geertsema, E. M.; Leigh, D. A. A synthetic small molecule that can walk down a track. Nat. Chem. 2009, 2, 96.
2. Qu, D. H.; Tian, H. Synthetic small-molecule walkers at work. Chem. Sci. 2013, 4, 3031.